s he stood unknown in that high hall, and thus he made reply--

V.

"From Samos came I, mighty king, and Syloson my name;
My brother was Polycrates, a chief well known to fame;
That brother drove me from my home--a wanderer forth I went--
And since that hour my weary soul has never known content!

VI.

"Methinks I need not tell to thee my brother's mournful fate;
He lies within his bloody grave--a churl usurps his state--
Moeandrius lords it o'er the land, my brother's base born slave;
Restore me to that throne, oh king! this, this, the boon I crave.

VII.

"Nay, start not; let me tell my tale! I pray thee look on me,
And, prince, thou soon shalt know the cause that I ask this gift of thee;
Round Persia's king a bristling ring of spearmen standeth now,
But when Cambyses wore the crown--a wanderer poor wast _thou_!

VIII.

"Remember'st not, oh king! the day when, in old Memphis town,
Upon the night ye won the fight, thou wast pacing up and down?
The costly cloak that then I wore, its colours charm'd thy eye--
In sooth it was a gorgeous robe, of purple Tyrian dye--

IX.

"Let base-born peasants buy and sell, I gave that cloak to thee!
And for that gift on thee bestow'd, grant thou this boon to me--
I ask not silver, ask not gold--I ask of thee to stand
A prince once more on Samos' shore--my own ancestral land!"

X.

"Oh! best and noblest," quoth the king, "thou ne'er shalt rue the day,
When to Cambyses' spearman poor thou gav'st thy cloak away;
The faithless eye each well-known form and feature may forget,
But the deeds of generous kindness done--the heart remembers yet.

XI.

"To-day thou art a wanderer sad, but thou shalt sit, erelong,
Within thy fair ancestral hall, and hear the minstrel's song;
To-day thou art a homeless man--to-morrow thou shalt stand--
A conqueror and a sceptred king--upon thy native land.

XII.

"A cloud is on thy brow to-day--thy lot is poor and low,
To all who gaze on thee thou seem'st a man of want and wo;
But thou shalt drain the bowl erelong within thy own bright isle,
A wreath of roses round thy head, and on thy brow a smile."

XIII.

And he called the proud Otanes, one of the seven was he
Who laid the Magian traitor low, and set their country free;
And he bade him man a gallant fleet, and sail without delay,
To the pleasant isle of Samos, in the fair Icarian bay.

XIV.